Wooden Trailer

[MassiveD]

I noticed at least one post about a wooden trailer, but it didn't get a lot of support on page one. Sorta understandable. However, I have used the one above for 25 or 30 years, and it has been fine.

One question that came up was how could one get such a thing legally on the road in the US:

A) This trailer was designed by an engineer with a lot of experience at multiple levels of novelty, and I think it was for a boat weighing about 2000-2800 pounds, depending on whether stripped or loaded. I did talk to him about it again 5 or 10 years ago, and he was skeptical about all large boat trailering in face of many new restrictions, but I noticed that he was still using his wooden trailer in this video:

Jump in about 50 minutes for some views of the trailer.

A boat trailer is different from a Teardrop, or can be. The boat is a separate part, while is some approaches to camper-trailers, the structure is integrated, so as to be capable of adding strength to the trailer or replacing some of it's parts. So it is natural that in the end product there is a place where the metal ends and the wood (or whatever) starts. And that is how a camper version would be described. It doesn't have a wooden axle or wheels, and it doesn't have a wooden tow hitch, but it is a camper, they are never 100% metal.

C) Never call it wood, if you can avoid it. It is a metal and fiberglass composite structure, like the Corvette.

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The other two trailers I own are metal, one steel and one Aluminum. So I am not deterred by their cost, or materials.What made me think of wood again is that I am interested in making a wedge trailer, like the common utility trailers or the fancy trailers made by Safari Condo:

In the spirit of a Teardrop, maybe 2/3rd the size. that would knock 60 percent of the weight out, before gutting the interior, and making everything out of lighter materials.

These campers basically incorporate a boat trailer shape into the floor plan. Though I do notice as I look at it now, that what I am planing would require the wheels to be outside the box which would increase drag a little. However, the weight savings of using the box as the trailer frame would be worth it. One certainly could have the wheels inside the box, but it would really complicate maters.

 

[Tony Latham]

One question that came up was how could one get such a thing legally on the road in the US:

It all depends on the laws in your state. In Idaho, there isn't a safety inspection. In England, as I understand it, it's not going to happen.

Tony

 

[MassiveD]

+1

There isn't a safety inspections where I live either. Though at least the original boat trailer was built from plans with an engineer's stamp. Though it would all need redoing for the different use. But at least I am confident in the technology, particularly given the far smaller weight of teardrops relative to the 26 foot boat my trailer was designed for.

Years ago there was a tragic loss at sea of a sailor who's radical mono had a wing keel with a torpedo of lead for ballast. The boat ultimately washed up but the lead never did, and we have no way of knowing when it made it's departure. Outside wrote two articles on the tragedy, and in both gave support to a claim made in litigation that there was no metal to metal attachment from the torpedo to the boat. This because the method of attachment was wet lashing with carbon toe (I believe). But the boat was made of plastic and fiber. There is no way to make a metal to metal connection without the metal fastener on the boat having no metal to metal connection itself, some point along the chain. Of course it is possible to design an insufficient connection.

I can well imagine it could seem dicey to inspectors not well informed on the mater that there is not a continuous metal to metal load path from hitch to axle, though at some point there will need to be a transition to wood on a wooden teardrop.